Promoting Sleep in Mothers of Low Birth Weight Infants: a Pilot Study Adequate sleep is essential to psychological and physical health and may also attenuate the negative effects of stress. Sleep disturbances are common in mothers of healthy infants. Having a low birth weight (LBW) infant hospitalized in an intensive care unit (ICU) intensifies sleep disturbances. Specifically, mothers' extended periods of exposure to the artificial dim light in ICU environments leads to circadian phase desynchronosis, and concern about the infant's health leads to hyperarousal. The aim of this pilot study is to examine whether an intervention that includes bright light therapy will lead to clinically significant improvements in sleep, fatigue, depression, and physical health of mothers of LBW infants. The pilot study is based upon an impaired sleep model and will use a double-blinded pretest-posttest, two-group randomized experimental design to test the intervention. Thirty-two first-time mothers of hospitalized LBW infants will be randomized to the treatment group (blue- green bright light therapy and sleep hygiene booklet) or the control group (placebo red light and nutrition booklet). Both groups of mothers will receive an educational package including a booklet (Early Arrival) explaining how to care for premature babies. Selected maternal sleep variables (nocturnal total sleep time, wake after sleep onset, day total sleep time) will be measured using sleep diaries and actigraphy at two time periods: 1) pre-treatment during the second week post-partum prior to the intervention and 2) post-treatment at the end of the 3-week intervention. Impaired sleep outcomes, such as fatigue, depression and poor physical health will also be measured at pre- and post-treatment. Data analysis will involve comparing the two groups to examine whether there were clinically significant differences in sleep and health-related variables. Results from this study will be useful in ascertaining whether a larger scale randomized clinical trial to test this intervention is warranted. Data relevant for conducting a larger scale clinical trial will be collected, including information about problems associated with using the light visor and sleep hygine booklet and nature and extent of participant attrition. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The specific aim for the proposed pretest-posttest, two-group randomized experimental study is to examine whether an intervention that includes bright light therapy will lead to clinically significant improvements in sleep, fatigue, depression, and physical health of mothers of LBW infants. The interventions that we are testing, if demonstrated to be effective, could be extremely helpful in guiding nurses and other health care practitioners to promote mothers' physical and emotional well-being. [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable] [unreadable]